With Saw X taking us back to more of Jigsaw's (Tobin Bell) back story, it appears that there are still stories to tell in the Saw-niverse. (The Saw-Universe). Box office-wise, the film made only $18 million on its opening weekend, it finished behind Paw Patrol, mostly thanks to the meme Saw Patrol which married the kiddie flick with the horror favorite for an even more unique double feature than Barb-enheimer. $18 million dollars is a far cry from the early 2000s heyday of the franchise when $30 million dollar opening weekends were the norm, but nevertheless, the franchise is wildly profitable thanks to its relatively low budget and its high level of gory excitement. Loyal Saw-ties, as I call my fellow Saw fans, will always turn out for this incredible franchise, arguably the best horror franchise of all time.
With that in mind, with 10 Saw movies in the books, it's time to rank the Saw franchise. What is your favorite Saw movie Saw-ties? My top 10 is below...
10. Jigsaw - 2017- Jigsaw retcons a little too much of John Kramer-Jigsaw's back story and is rather derivative in terms of the traps and the gore involved. The first trap, the Barn Trap, is a near complete ripoff of Saw four which also featured a series of inter-connected victims failing to work together and ending up dead for their selfish ways. There is also the way in which the film cheats the overall Saw timeline that left a bad taste in my mouth. This is the rare, not good Saw movie. Most of the Saw movies, in my estimation, are actually good movies.
9. Spiral from the Book of Saw -2021- Big stars really don't have a place in the Saw franchise. Movie stars, even one as minor as Chris Rock, tend to go into movies like this with too much of what I call 'Main Character Powers.' The chances that Rock was going to end up in a Saw trap with his hand or leg or head cut off were minimal simply because he's a movie star, a big name celebrity. The other Saw movies made smart choices for their players. Recognizable faces like Scott Patterson from Gilmore Girls and Costas Mandylor have faces you know but they are not movie stars. Thus, they can die at any moment in a Saw movie and no one is going to get too upset. The Saw movies, after the original, are ensemble films with multiple stories unfolding. Movie stars pull all of the focus away from Jigsaw, the traps, and the plot.
8. Saw 2 -2005- I like Saw 2, I like the energy that Donnie Wahlberg brings to this franchise. He's right in the lead actor sweet spot for a Saw movie, not a big movie star but a guy with a recognizable face. I like how his hard headedness is both his best quality as a cop and his downfall as a person. He's determined to save the life of his son but he blows the whole case because he can't control his anger. It's a phenomenal twist ending. That said, outside of Wahlberg's confrontation with Jigsaw, what remains of Saw 2 stumbles around a bit. The filmmakers haven't quite found the formula yet that binds the Saw philosophy to horror movie scares. Saw 2 is like a schematic for the better Saw movies to follow and improve upon.
7. Saw 3D aka Saw 7 -2010- The end of the Detective Hoffman arc was a bit of a letdown for me. I hated seeing what happened to Betsy Russell's Jill Tuck and it bummed me out enough to push Saw 3D low on this list. And that's despite the much welcomed return of Cary Elwes as Doctor Gordon. Gordon as an apprentice of Jigsaw is a great reveal and the way the noose encircles the main character, Bobby (Sean Patrick Flannery) is terrific. I'm too sad about Jill Tuck to put Saw 3D higher on this list.
6. Saw 4 -2007- The first post-Jigsaw's death Saw movie struggles a little to get going but once it does, the battle between Hoffman and Strahn, and the main trap centered on Officer Rigg is tremendous. We finally get to learn the fate of Detective Matthews and that ending, it's a heartbreaker.
